By Mark S. Bacon

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Eddie Collins, private eye and part-time Hollywood actor, is hired by ageing actor, Sam Roth, to locate his disowned son, Jack Callahan. Roth hopes to reconcile their relationship before his “Martini Shot” last scene of the day, as he is in his 90s.

While working the Roth case, Eddie receives a letter from his daughter’s adoptive parents, that she would like to meet him and find out more about her mom. In spite of his uncertainty, Eddie agrees to meet her. What will this relationship lead to in the future and what will all parties make of it? Only time will tell.

Eddie locates Callahan, leading to a father and son meeting. However, he later gets a call from Roth, informing him that his son has been found, bludgeoned to death. Sam asks Eddie to find out what has happened to Jack. Eddie investigates Jack’s life, hoping to find clues to the murder. Little does he know that upon discovering the murderer, his own life will hang in the balance.

This is the fourth in the Eddie Collins series. It is preceded by Murder Unscripted, Red Desert and Velvet on a Tuesday Afternoon.

* * *

Clive Rosengren is a recovering actor. His career spanned more than forty years, eighteen of them pounding many of the same streets as his fictional sleuth Eddie Collins. He appeared on stages at the Great Lakes Shakespeare Festival, the Guthrie Theater, and the Oregon Shakespeare Festival, among others. Movie credits include Ed Wood, Soapdish, Cobb, and Bugsy. Among numerous television credits are Seinfeld, Home Improvement, and Cheers, where he played the only person to throw Sam Malone out of his own bar. He lives in southern Oregon’s Rogue Valley, safe and secure from the hurly-burly of Hollywood. The first two books in the series were finalists for the Shamus Awards, sponsored by the Private Eye Writers of America.

Summer 1566. A glittering royal progress approaches Oxford. A golden age of prosperity, scientific advances, exploration and artistic magnificence. Elizabeth I’s Protestant government has much to celebrate.

But one young Catholic courtier isn’t cheering.

Conflicting passions—patriotism and religion—wage war in his heart. On this day, religion wins. Sir Edward Latham throws away his title, kin, and country to serve Catholic monarchs abroad.

But his wandering doesn’t quiet his soul, and when Europe’s religious wars threaten his beloved England and his family, patriotism prevails. Latham switches sides and becomes a double agent for Queen Elizabeth. Life turns complicated and dangerous as he balances protecting country and queen, while entreating both sides for peace.

Intrigue, lust, and war combine in this debut historical novel.

* * *

An Australian-American, Loretta Goldberg earned a BA in English literature, musicology and history at the University of Melbourne. After teaching English for a year, she came to the US on a Fulbright scholarship to study piano. She earned an MA in music performance at Hunter College, New York. She built a financial services practice, which she sold recently to focus on writing. She’s written articles on financial planning, arts reviews and political satire.

In eighteenth century London, porcelain is the most seductive of commodities. Fortunes are made and lost upon it. Kings do battle with knights and knaves for possession of the finest pieces and the secrets of their manufacture.

For Genevieve Planché, an English-born descendant of Huguenot refugees, porcelain holds far less allure; she wants to be an artist, a painter of international repute, but nobody takes the idea of a female artist seriously in London. If only she could reach Venice.

When Genevieve meets the charming Sir Gabriel Courtenay, he offers her an opportunity she can’t refuse; if she learns the secrets of porcelain manufacture, he will send her to Venice. But in particular, she must learn the secrets of the colour blue.

The ensuing events take Genevieve deep into England’s emerging industrial heartlands, where not only does she learn about porcelain, but also about the art of industrial espionage.

She also learns much about love.

With the heart and spirit of her Huguenot ancestors, Genevieve faces her challenges head on, but how much is she willing to suffer in pursuit and protection of the colour blue?

* * *

Nancy Bilyeau has worked on the staffs of InStyle, DuJour, Rolling Stone, Entertainment Weekly, and Good Housekeeping. She is currently the deputy editor of the Center on Media, Crime and Justice at City University of New York and a regular contributor to Town & Country, Purist, and The Vintage News.

She earned a BA at the University of Michigan. The Crown, her first novel and an Oprah pick, was published in 2012; the sequel, The Chalice, followed in 2013 and the third in the trilogy, The Tapestry, was published in 2015. This is her fourth novel.

Shamus award winning writer Myers brings out her sixth Maggie Sullivan mystery. The series started in the 1930s. It’s now 1942 in Dayton, Ohio.

Murderer or independent woman? Murder at a construction site draws Ohio private investigator Maggie Sullivan into a case that makes cops mistrust her and friends doubt her. The suspect, Rachel Minsky, is Maggie’s closest friend – and all signs point to Rachel’s guilt.

Rachel ignores the rules society imposes on women. That independence, in 1942, as well as her success in business, has made her enemies. Yet the dead man also had an unsavory secret or two, starting with his missing mistress. Who was the murderer’s real target? And what is Rachel hiding from the only person who can save her?

The city Maggie scours for clues to the real killer has been altered by America’s recent entry into World War II. Shortages of men and material have created new motives for murder. As the case and Maggie’s relationship with policeman Mick Connelly heat up, Maggie finds herself caught in currents that threaten to drown her.

M. Ruth Myers, author of more than a dozen books, was a newspaper reporter in Michigan and Ohio. Her books have been translated into seven languages. She earned the Shamus Award in 2014 for Don’t Dare A Dame, the third book in her Maggie Sullivan series. Find Myers at https://ruthnew.com/bookstag/maggie/

Cynthia Kuhn’s latest book is the second in her academic mystery series. The first book in the series, The Semester of our Discontent, received the Agatha Award.

When Professor Lila Maclean is sent to interview celebrated author and notorious cad Damon Von Tussel, he disappears before her very eyes. The English department is thrown into chaos by the news, as Damon is supposed to headline Stonedale University’s upcoming Arts Week.

The chancellor makes it clear that he expects Lila to locate the writer and set events back on track immediately. But someone appears to have a different plan: strange warnings are received, valuable items go missing, and a series of dangerous incidents threaten the lives of Stonedale’s guests. After her beloved mother, who happens to be Damon’s ex, rushes onto campus and into harm’s way, Lila has even more reason to bring the culprit to light before anything—or anyone—else vanishes.

Cynthia Kuhn is professor of English at Metropolitan State University of Denver and current president of Sisters in Crime-Colorado. The Art of Vanishing was a a Lefty Award nominee for best humorous Mystery. The third in the series, The Spirit in Question, will be out in the fall. Visit her at cynthiakuhn.net.

Set in an imagined town outside Tokyo, Clarissa Goenawan’s dark, literary debut follows a young man’s path to self-discovery in the wake of his sister’s murder. Ren Ishida has nearly completed his graduate degree at Keio University when he receives news of his sister’s violent death. Keiko was stabbed one rainy night on her way home, and there are no leads. Ren heads to Akakawa to conclude his sister’s affairs, failing to understand why she chose to turn her back on the family and Tokyo for this desolate place years ago.

But then Ren is offered Keiko’s newly vacant teaching position at a prestigious local cram school and her bizarre former arrangement of free lodging at a wealthy politician’s mansion in exchange for reading to the man’s ailing wife. He accepts both, abandoning Tokyo and a crumbling relationship there in order to better understand his sister’s life and what took place the night of her death.

Clarissa Goenewan is a debut novelist. She is an Indonesian-born Singaporean writer. Her award-winning short fiction has appeared in literary magazines and anthologies in Singapore, Australia, the UK, and the US. Goenewan’s website home is: http://clarissagoenawan.com/

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Desert Kill Switch has more than one crime to solve. When I read a mystery, I enjoy keeping track of clues and trying to solve the puzzles. But I also like a mystery that moves apace, making me worry about the safety of the lead characters. This is the kind of mystery I wrote in Desert Kill Switch.

The book is two overlapping stories in one:

Lyle Deming is a stressed out ex-homicide detective who drives a cab in Nostalgia City, the Arizona retro theme park, as his escape from the disappointments and anxieties of police work. But on page one of the novel, Lyle discovers a body in the desert next to a pristine 1970s car. When he comes back to the scene with sheriff’s deputies, the car and body are gone. Was he seeing things?

Kate Sorensen, a former college basketball star, is Nostalgia City’s PR VP and she’s in Reno working in an exhibit booth. She’s representing her employer at a sprawling retro festival featuring classic cars and rock ’n’ roll. She’s accused of trying to steal the Reno festival and move it to Arizona. Worse, she’s accused of killing the festival chairman.

Lyle arrives in Reno to help his blonde, not-quite-girlfriend and they plow through a deadly tangle of suspects and motives. Kate and Lyle hit one dead end after another as they struggle to exonerate Kate, catch a blackmailer, save a witness’s life, and help find the missing corpse.